


One Life

by rowofstars



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Awkwardness, Cohabitation, F/M, Fluff, Miscommunication, Mutual Pining, Pete's World, Pete's World Torchwood, Post-Episode: s04e13 Journey's End, Romance, Sexual Content, Sharing a Bed, Smut
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-09-07
Updated: 2017-09-06
Packaged: 2018-12-24 18:09:26
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,147
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12018243
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rowofstars/pseuds/rowofstars
Summary: After the events of Journey's End, Rose and the (new) Doctor are left to live their one life together. To do that means they have to figure out how to reconcile that the person standing beside them is both a soulmate and a stranger.But before all that, Rose and the original Tenth Doctor have one last moment together.





	One Life

**Author's Note:**

> So this fic was partially written a looooong time ago, 2009 to be exact, and posted on Livejournal. I wasn't very well known anywhere at the time, and it went largely unacknowledged. I had intentions and plans and things, you know, how you do, except they just never quite came about. I got stuck, didn't know where to go with it, and by the time I figured it out, well I was on to other things. But I'm back now and revising, tweaking, and expanding into something that I hope you all enjoy.

They were all just kidding themselves for a few hours. Laughing, hugging and celebrating like a misfit family; the Doctor and his children of time. Rose is amazed at how much the TARDIS still feels like home, and how comforting it is to have that gentle hum at the back of her mind again. It’s something she didn’t know she was missing until it was gone. It was one of the discomforting aspects of being stuck in the wrong universe; she always felt alone, even in her own mind.

For a little while, as they piloted the TARDIS and returned all the planets to their proper places, it was almost like the previous three years were just a bad dream. It’s a good thing, a fantastic thing really, being together again, but there are sayings about good things and endings.

She takes a few minutes for herself, leaving the console room and drifting down the hallway, her fingers glancing along the coral walls as she walks. A gentle warmth welcomes her fingertips with every brush, the ship almost vibrating with happiness at her presence. She laughs a little and presses her palm flat against one of the pillars that arches up overhead. There’s a brief glow beneath her hand and she lets it trail down the coral before slipping away.

She feels it in her mind, hears it too, in a strange way, and she steps back in surprise. 

_I missed you too, Bad Wolf._

Shaking her head, she continues on down the corridor to the next intersection and looks around. To her left is one of the libraries, her favorite one with the big stone fireplace and all the pillows on the floor, to the right is a hall of bedrooms. She bites her lip and then turns, wondering if her room is the same as it was before.

Unexpectedly, Rose finds the door partly open and the lights dimmed. The Doctor, the proper brown-suited Doctor, stands alone by the end of her bed, hands characteristically shoved in his pockets. He’s looking, but not really; just sort of taking in things, like he’s looking at a painting he’s seen a hundred times. 

She clears her throat, and he startles like she’s caught him someplace he has no right to be.

“Rose,” he says softly. “I’m sorry – I, um, come here sometimes, to think.” 

He still has to explain everything, even what should be simple; he comes here to think about her, to be surrounded by what he’s lost. “I hope that’s okay? I mean, it’s still your room of course. The TARDIS kept it just as you left it, you know, just in case. She’s very good like that, knows just what to keep.”

His nerves are obvious in the way he halts his babbling and gives her a tight grin and doesn’t look at her for too long. The corners of her mouth curve into a small smile as she steps into the room. All her things are still in place, undisturbed, but not dusty. One of the many benefits of living in the TARDIS, it’s completely anti-dust. The plush, light pink carpet and the one hot pink wall where her bed sits seem a million miles away from the person she is now. Her room on the other side is a cool blue, like his eyes used to be. 

“I didn’t see you leave,” she says. “But I guess that might have been the other you being there.” He gives her a half smile and a shrug. “It’s a bit confusing.” 

(That’s the first understatement.) 

Now her nerves are showing. She fiddles with the buttons on her jacket, eyes skipping around the room, looking for a place to land. “He, uh, might take some getting used to.” 

(There’s the second.)

“Yeah about that -” the Doctor starts. “ _Him_ , I mean. I need to sort of, sort that bit out…” 

His words and eyes trail off, looking into the middle distance, somewhere near her bed. He scratches the back of his head and ruffles his hair a little.

She sighs. “I don’t care about any of that.”

He pauses, hand still on top of his head, tufts of hair sticking out between his slender fingers. When it’s clear that’s all she has to say on the matter, he lets out the breath he was holding and his hand drops back into his pocket. 

She steps further into the room and moves to his side, her eyes studying the swoops and swirls of pattern in the carpet. He seems to find the coloring of her duvet fascinating for the moment. He tries to see how this will go, but it’s one of the future threads that always remains blurred, like the lines between them.

“There are a lot of things I should say.” For him that’s almost an admission.

“I know.” 

Rose doesn’t look up from the floor, but she reaches out and curls her fingers around his wrist. He shifts his arm a little, and then they’re palm to palm, fingers threaded just like old times. He turns to her and there’s the slightest change in pressure from his hand to hers, a gentle squeeze to get her to look at him. It’s the same soft brown hair, brown suit and thousand years of baggage in his eyes. He’s still him. 

But she’s not sure she’s still her.

The Doctor sits on the end of the bed and tugs on her arm, moving her to stand between his legs. She likes this not quite eye-to-eye position, looking down at him for a change, feeling a little more in control. He takes her other hand in his, raising them to his lips to place a kiss on the back of each one. She gives him a smile, but it never reaches her eyes and fades too quickly. The lump in her throat is growing and she swallows hard.

“How much time do we have? Until the rift closes, I mean?” She won’t say what she’s really thinking; until you send me back, until this falls apart again.

He sighs heavily, his shoulders slumping as he watches their fingers play, threading and sliding over each other. The touch of her skin calms every atom in his body in a way nothing else can, and he for this long moment he remembers what peace feels like.

Minutes pass and there are things to be said, but it’s just another reticent moment in a history of saying nothing, when they should be saying everything.

He breaks first. “We have - time.”

Leaning her forehead against his, she asks again, “How much time?”

The Doctor swallows and licks his lips. “Enough.” 

There’s meaning, but no declarations in the press of lips and tongues. If there is such a thing as a slow frenzy Rose thinks this must be it. There is all the haste of their first time, and the languid passion of their hundredth. Her hands move to the back of his head, made more unruly by the winding of her fingers in his hair. 

His hands skim down her back, coming to rest on her hips and pull her forward until their bodies are flush, fingers inching up the hem of her shirt to make slow circles on the small of her back. She feels an urgency to the whole situation, but the slow glide of his tongue over hers is a distracting contradiction. In her core something else is building entirely, leaving her hot and wanting for him. She presses her thighs together, her intimate muscles clench around nothing, empty and throbbing, needing him this one last time. 

The Doctor pushes at her blue jacket and she moves back, breaking the kiss so she can take it off. The coat hits the floor with a muted thump as his teeth and tongue trail gently down her neck, picking all the right places to nip and soothe. Her nipples push against the sensible cotton of her bra and she wishes there had had been time to change into something sexier between hopping dimensions and fighting Daleks. Yet she knows he couldn't care less, he always wants her just how she is, without airs or pretense.

He pushes her bright pink shirt up over her chest and suckles one of the sensitive peaks through the fabric of the bra. He worries it with his teeth, the sharp sensation hitting straight in her center. She whimpers with need, her hips pressing towards him, and she can feel a slick wetness in her knickers.

He doesn’t bother to remove her shirt or bra, just pushes the offending cloth out of his way. Oral fixation fully unleashed, he worships her breasts with lips and tongue as she arches her back, trying to get as close to him as possible. 

Rose gasps, her nails scraping over his scalp as she holds him close. “Oh - _god_ , Doctor!”

He pauses and looks up at her, his eyes dark and his grin just a little bit manic. “You want more, Rose Tyler?”

Her head falls back on a moan. The way he drawls out the syllables of her name always undoes something inside her. She isn’t just a girl from a council estate, she’s so much more. She’s Rose Tyler, Defender of the Earth, companion of the Doctor, the woman who became all of time and space for a single instant.

“Yeah,” she breathes, pushing out her breasts as his thumbs rub circles around her nipples. “Yeah, I want - _oh_ \- more.”

She barely registers the tug on her zipper, preoccupied with getting her hands inside his suit jacket, and leaving a love bite on the side of his neck. It will be above the collar where everyone can see it, and she selfishly hopes it lasts until he meets his next companion. Pulling back, his eyes darken when the scent of her arousal hits him, but when he looks up at her it isn’t hunger or desire she sees, it’s a bone deep longing she knows too well. 

Her jeans fall and catch on her knees as he pushes his hands in and around to squeeze her bum, pulling her awkwardly into his lap. Her legs are trapped in denim, but she tries to straddle him anyway, causing both of them to fall backwards in a heap on the bed. She laughs and he smiles, rolling them over until she’s pinned underneath him.

He sits up on his knees, his legs on either side of hers, cock straining against the pinstriped fabric. She licks her lips and he makes a sound as his eyes flutter. She knows he’s thinking what she’s thinking, but it’s been too long and they only have just enough time. He hooks his fingers in the thin pink cotton of her panties, and pulls them to the side, brushing her sex. Her hips lift off the bed, desperately seeking to be filled. One long, middle finger slips between her folds and pushes inside, and he watches as her whole body tenses, her hands clawing at the deep pink duvet. He strokes deeply, pressing one and then two fingers into her, making her arch into his touch. It’s almost what she needs and a moan pushes through her kiss swollen lips. 

Abruptly his fingers retreat and she nearly screams at the loss, but bites her lip instead. She tells herself she can’t let him see how much she needs this, but his smirk says it’s already too late. Raising his finger to his lips, he licks and sucks the digit clean like it was covered in jam. There are no words between them as his eyes roam up and down her body. Her jeans are bunched around her knees, knickers pulled aside, her shirt and bra still on but her breasts exposed and marked in red by his mouth. He touches her reverently, his palm flattening over her heart.

The time they have is limited whatever he might say about _enough_ ; it’s a falsehood he hopes she’ll ignore for now. He grins down at her, holding her gaze and slides two fingers inside her again, pumping them in and out as she keens. One hand comes up to the back of his neck and pulls him down for a sloppy, wet kiss.

He pulls her panties down until they meet her jeans, then his hand slips between her thighs. His fingers glide over over her slick flesh, already sensitive from his earlier teasing. Rose’s fingers curl around his wrist as he starts to thrust into her faster, harder - a taste of what’s to come. His thumb presses against her clit, coaxing her closer to the release she craves.

She doesn’t say it, and neither does he, those words that have tethered them together across dimensions. He thinks maybe if he doesn’t, then it will hurt less when he lets her go - when he _makes_ her go. He will never see her like this again, hear the emotion in her voice, feel her love him with her whole being. She comes around his fingers, crying out his name, and both of his hearts break. 

He know it’s all been a lie. There will never be such a thing as enough time.

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

Later, The Doctor leaves them off, one by one, making a point to remember Croydon, not Aberdeen, this time. A few bone crushing hugs and some friendly farewells see them returned home, all back to their regularly scheduled lives, changed forever by a madman in a blue box. Even now he never really says goodbye to any of them.

And then there is one last trip and a sadly familiar beach. 

Jackie prattles on about ‘bloody Norway’ and tries to pretend none of this bothers her anymore as she rings Pete for transportation, but Rose only hears him and the words she knew were coming.

It sounds all very well and good, a very Doctor plan if she’s ever heard one. Plot the best course of action to keep the universe neat and tidy, damn anyone’s objections. He’ll always choose the path that exposes him to the least amount of domestic heartbreak, always thinking he knows best. Her only problem with that is he usually does.

Her mouth is too dry, her tongue thick and unwieldy as she tries to speak, and she can’t remember the last time she slept or even tried to catch her breath. Her heart is pounding. She wants to run. The fact is she started running years ago in a basement, headlong into a moment, and never stopped. The words slip of their own free will, an eleventh hour demand for him to say it and mean it, if he was ever going to at all.

“And how was that sentence going to end?” she says, the wind stinging her cheek as she turns to the Doctor in the brown suit.

It’s a question and a dare. He might want to answer; to let this be the one time he doesn’t avoid, deflect, or answer a question with a question. 

He won’t. There’s a sense that he’s already missed his chance, that this isn’t his moment to have anymore.

The Doctor lowers his eyes briefly, and she already knows that he won’t take what she’s offering, but she allows herself the fantasy for one more second. It’s not in him to acknowledge the unspoken thing between them, but it doesn’t make it any less true. She almost understands why, but it would be nice to hear it once so she can know Sarah Jane was right; some things are worth getting your heart broken. 

The look on his face kills her with its finality. Close to the surface, tip of his tongue, but forever holding back. If the words fall, it’s fatal and he’ll never leave this beach without her. 

At least he looks her in the eye when he lets her down.

“Does it need saying?”

She wants to say no.

There is a part of her that’s been painfully aware of the unsaid since a pair of blue eyes held her hand at the end of the world. She missed the words before, when he was just an image killing a star to say goodbye, but afterwards she insisted she didn’t need them, that it was enough to know they might be said someday. He faded to nothing in front of her, but she was so sure of what he was going to say, believed in him as he did in her, and almost broke two universes to get back to him.

Now she’s sure she wants it to be said, maybe that means she needs it too. This is where they end.

She turns to the other, the one in the blue suit. “And you?”

She’s losing her footing on the sand, her heart wants to explode, and it’s wrong, wrong, wrong – _right_. He feels the same and tastes the same, like dust and sunlight and bananas. His arms wrap around her, holding her tight, and she wants to laugh and cry at the same time.

He knows this is it. She forced his hand and he folded, willingly. He wants to give her nothing less than everything, but instead he gives her a reflection of himself and hopes it’s enough. She will be good for the other him just as she was good for the old him; in that regard he did the right thing. As for the rest, he’s not so sure.

A hum from the TARDIS tells him the rift won’t hold much longer, and there is still the matter of Donna’s fragile mind. It’s time to go, again, but before he steps through the TARDIS door, he breaks his one golden rule. 

He looks back.

Rose feels it, and the shock of finality settles in causing her to pull away. Her feet want to start running, but the last blue fades from sight and she stumbles. She blinks and then there’s a hand in hers, the familiar feel of a solid, timeless presence. She turns and looks up at him, the same face, the same eyes, the same really great hair. Suddenly everything feels wrong again and she hates herself for it. She looks at the spot where the TARDIS was, the ground unchanged as if it was never there at all.

Her shoes are sinking into the sand and the wind is biting her skin and whipping her hair in her face, but there’s a pressure on her fingers and an unexpected warmth. She looks up and he’s still looking back at her, still holding her hand. One life, he said, if she’ll have him. She wants to believe that she can, that she’ll let herself and not wish for anything more. 

The Doctor is gone forever, and right by her side.


End file.
